V. 


$w 


MAUDE    ADAMS 


MAUDE 
ADAMS 


By 
ACTON    DAVIES 


NEW    YORK    •    FREDERICK    A. 
STOKES    COMPANY  •  Publishers 


Copyright,  1901,  by 
FREDERICK  A.  STOKES  COMPANY 

Published  September, 


Tht    Uni-virsttj    Prtss 
Cambridge,    U.  S.  A. 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


Miss  Maude  Adams  (Photogravure)  Frontispiece 

As    Adrienne    in     "  The    Celebrated  page 

Case" 4 

With  Flora  Walsh  in  "  The  Wan- 
dering Boys " 10 

As  Dot  Bradbery  in  "  The  Midnight 

Bell" 14 

As  Dot  Bradbery  in  "  The  Midnight 

Bell" 20 

As  Dora  in  "  Men  and  Women  "     .  24 

As  Nell  in  "  The  Lost  Paradise  "     .  30 

As  Suzanne  in  "  The  Masked  Ball "  34 

As  Miriam  in  "  Butterflies  "   .     .     .  40 

As  Dora  in  "  Christopher,  Jr."     .     .  44 
With  John   Drew  as  Mrs.  Dennant 
and   Mr.    Kilroy  in  "  The  Squire  of 

Dames " 50 

As   Jessie    Keber   in   "  The    Bauble 

Shop" 54 


•;'-< 


ILL U S? RA ? IONS 

Miss  Maude  Adams  with  John  Drew  as  page 
Dolly  and  Sir  Jasper  in  "  Rosemary  "  60 
As  Lady  Babbie  in  "The  Little 

Minister  "     Act  1 64 

As    Lady    Babbie    in   "The   Little 

Minister  "     Act  II 70 

As   Lady    Babbie    in    "The   Little 

Minister  "     Act  IIJ 74 

As  Juliet  in  "  Romeo  and  Juliet  "  .        80 
As  Juliet  in  "  Romeo  and  Juliet  " 

Act  1 84 

As     Duke     of     Reichstadt    in 

"  L'Aiglon  "      Act  1 90 

As     Duke     of    Reichstadt     in 

"  L'Aiglon  "     Act  1 94 

As     Duke     of    Reichstadt    in 
"L'Aiglon"     Act  IV 100 


MAUDE 


Part    First 


SOMEWHERE  out  in  Salt 
Lake  City  there  exists  to 
this  day  —  if  it  has  n't 
been  broken  —  an  old-fashioned 
china  meat  platter  which  nowa- 
days could  be  sold  for  its  weight 
in  gold.  It  was  on  this  platter, 
about  twenty-nine  years  ago,  that 
Maude  Adams  made  her  first  ap- 
pearance on  any  stage.  Far  from 
being  a  pikce  de  resistance  in  those 
days,  Miss  Adams'  debut  was  con- 
sidered of  such  slight  importance 
that  even  her  name  did  not  figure 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

on  the  programme.  Indeed,  had 
it  not  been  for  the  fact  that  a  rival 
infantile  artist,  who  when  not  en- 
gaged on  the  stage  was  immersed 
in  the  interesting  occupation  of 
cutting  her  first  tooth,  succumbed 
at  a  crucial  moment  to  a  com- 
bined attack  of  temper  and  colic, 
Miss  Adams'  debut  would  in  all 
probability  have  been  postponed 
indefinitely,  —  or  at  all  events  until 
she  had  attained  to  the  dignity  of 
short  skirts  or  possibly  a  pigtail. 
At  the  time  of  Miss  Adams*  debut 
she  was  nine  months  old  to  a  day. 
Her  father,  Mr.  Kiscadden,  was 
engaged  in  business  in  Salt  Lake 
City,  and  his  wife,  the  actress 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

Annie  Adams,  was  at  that  time 
the  principal  character  actress  of 
the  stock  company  in  Salt  Lake. 
Miss  Maude  was  an  obstreperous 
sort  of  an  infant  with  a  marked 
partiality  for  her  mother's  society, 
so  in  order  that  the  baby  might  be 
as  near  her  as  possible  Mrs.  Adams 
used  to  carry  her  to  her  dressing- 
room  at  the  theatre  every  night. 
The  other  members  of  the  com- 
pany, men  and  women  alike,  were 
her  impromptu  nurses,  and  as  the 
bills  were  changed  very  frequently 
and  rehearsals  were  almost  inces- 
sant, little  Miss  Maudie  spent  more 
of  the  first  year  of  her  life  in  the 
theatre  than  she  did  in  her  own 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

home.  In  the  dressing-room 
which  her  mother  shared  with 
one  of  the  other  actresses,  Maudie 
lay  in  a  stage  cradle  watching  in 
mute  amazement  while  her  mother 
metamorphosed  herself  with  the 
aid  of  wigs  and  grease  paint  into 
a  series  of  characters  which  during 
the  course  of  a  season  would  vary 
all  the  way  from  the  "Queen"  in 
Hamlet  to  "Sairey  Gamp." 
It  was  the  fashion  in  those  days  to 
end  the  night's  performance  with 
a  roaring  farce.  On  the  night  of 
her  impromptu  debut  the  manager 
had  announced  a  comic  piece  in 
two  scenes  called  The  Lost  Child. 
Mrs.  Adams  was  cast  for  one  of 


MISS    MAUDE    ADAMS 
as  Adrieime  in  "The  Celebrated  Case.' 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

the  leading  roles  in  it.  The  first 
scene  had  passed  off  very  success- 
fully, and  the  baby  —  a  salaried 
member  of  the  company  who 
played  all  the  roles,  both  masculine 
and  feminine,  which  were  under  a 
year  old  —  had  scored  quite  a  hit. 
But  no  sooner  was  the  infant  re- 
moved from  the  stage  than  it  set 
up  a  most  unearthly  yell.  It  was 
one  of  those  weird  consecutive 
wails  which,  to  a  mother's  ear, 
mean  either  a  pin  or  a  wakeful 
night.  After  investigation  had 
proven  that  a  pin  had  nothing  to 
do  with  it,  the  mother,  turning  to 
the  stage  manager  in  sheer  despair, 
exclaimed  :  — 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

"  The  play  is  done  for.  When  she 
once  gets  started  crying  like  that 
she  never  thinks  of  stopping  under 
two  hours." 

"  But,  good  Heavens  !  We  '11  have 
to  gag  her.  The  play  must  go  on 
somehow,"  cried  the  stage  mana- 
ger. "  The  audience  knows  what 's 
coming.  They  've  seen  the  play 
before,  and  if  we  don't  bring  that 
youngster  in  on  a  platter,  why, 
they  '11  pull  down  the  house." 
"  Why  not  try  Maudie  ? "  said  Mrs. 
Adams,  coming  to  the  rescue. 
"  She  's  down  in  my  dressing-room, 
and  as  I  am  on  the  stage  with  her 
I  'm  sure  she  '11  be  good." 
And  she  was  good  —  so  good,  in 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

fact,  that  her  rival  that  very  night 
received  her  two  weeks'  notice,  and 
for  the  remainder  of  that  season 
all  the  infant  roles  were  played  by 
little  Miss  Kiscadden. 
The  principal  cause  of  the  hit 
which  Miss  Maudie  made  with 
the  audience  that  night  was  the 
fact  that  the  original  baby  who 
had  appeared  in  the  first  scene  was 
only  six  weeks  old,  while  Maude, 
with  her  additional  seven  and  a 
half  months'  growth,  on  her  ap- 
pearance disclosed  the  startling  phe- 
nomenon that  the  youngster  had 
increased  a  good  twenty  pounds  in 
weight  inside  of  fifteen  minutes. 
At  the  age  of  two  Miss  Adams 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

closed  the  first  epoch  of  her  stage 
career.  Too  large  to  play  baby 
roles  effectively  any  longer,  there 
was  nothing  for  the  young  actress 
to  do  except  rest  on  her  laurels 
and  wait  until  she  was  able  to  talk 
distinctly.  During  the  following 
three  years  the  child  travelled  with 
her  mother  to  several  of  the  West- 
ern cities  where  the  company 
appeared.  The  greater  part  of  her 
time  was  spent  behind  the  scenes  of 
the  theatre,  —  indeed,  it  was  there 
that  she  learnt  her  letters,  —  but  no 
opportunity  to  act  offered  itself 
until  the  little  girl  had  attained 
her  fifth  birthday. 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Kiscadden  had  set- 


M  A  UP  E     ADAMS 

tied  in  San  Francisco  at  that  time, 
and  Mrs.  Adams  — as  Mrs.  Kiscad- 
den  was  always  known  upon  the 
stage  —  was  playing  in  the  support 
of  J.  K.  Emmett.  The  child  in 
the  play  had  proved  unsatisfac- 
tory, and  one  night  as  the  Kis- 
caddens  sat  at  dinner  Mrs.  Adams 
threw  a  small  thunderbolt  into  the 
family  circle  by  remarking  to  her 
husband,  — 

"  Look  here,  dear,  Mr.  Emmett 
wants  to  know  if  you  won't  let 
Maudie  go  on  and  play  that  child's 
part." 

"  Most  certainly  not/'  replied  Mr. 
Kiscadden.  "  She 's  my  only  daugh- 
ter, and  I  've  no  intention  of  letting 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

her  go  on  the  stage  and  make    a 
fool  of  herself." 

Maude,  who  had  listened  with  all 
her  ears  to  this  conversation,  sud- 
denly threw  down  her  knife  and 
fork  and  exclaimed,  — 
"  Father,  I  would  like  to  go  on 
the  stage,  and  Maudie  will  not 
make  a  fool  of  herself." 
That  settled  the  matter.  Mr.  Kis- 
cadden  finally  gave  his  consent,  and 
the  following  week,  in  a  pair  of 
tiny  knickerbockers,  Miss  Maude 
Adams  made  her  second  stage  ap- 
pearance. She  played  the  small 
boy,  Little  Schneider.  She  had 
nearly  a  hundred  lines  to  speak  in 
the  play,  but  she  memorised  them 

10 


MISS    MAUDE    ADAMS   WITH    MISS    FLORA    WALSH 
in  "The  Wandering  Buys." 


MAUDE     ADAMS 

in  a  couple  of  days,  and  on  the  first 
night  was  so  completely  letter  per- 
fect that  Mr.  Emmett  congratu- 
lated her.  There  was  one  scene 
which  worried  her  very  much, 
however.  In  one  act  she  had  to 
be  tied  on  a  water-wheel,  and"  un- 
less she  screamed  at  a  certain  in- 
stant the  whole  effect  of  the  act 
would  have  been  ruined.  This 
fact  was  duly  impressed  on  Maude 
by  her  mother  at  rehearsal,  and 
Mrs.  Adams  in  telling  the  story  of 
that  first  performance  says :  — 
"  I  wish  you  could  have  seen 
Maudie  that  night.  She  was  sim- 
ply wriggling  with  excitement.  It 
was  all  I  could  do  to  keep  her  in 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

my  dressing-room  until  the  cue 
came  for  her  to  go  on.  She  was 
most  critical  about  her  make-up, 
and  after  I  had  darkened  her  eye- 
lashes and  rouged  her  cheeks  she 
turned  to  me  very  seriously  and 
said,  <  Muffer,  are  you  sure  I  've  got 
louge  enough  on  ? '  Just  before 
the  curtain  went  up  I  made  her 
repeat  her  first-act  lines  to  me. 
She  had  learned  them  like  a  parrot, 
to  be  sure,  but  she  spoke  them 
like  a  true  little  actress.  I  had 
explained  the  story  of  the  play  to 
her  very  carefully,  and  she  seemed 
to  grasp  perfectly  the  important 
part  which  she  was  to  play  in  the 
plot.  The  one  thing  that  we  were 

12 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

all  nervous  about  was  that  mill- 
wheel  scene.  I  stood  in  the  wings 
and  watched  her  all  through  the 
first  act.  She  really  did  splendidly. 
When  the  mill-wheel  scene  came 
I  was  on  the  stage  too,  and  as  the 
critical  moment  came  nearer  and 
nearer  Maudie  would  whisper  to 
me  every  other  moment,  *  Muffer9 
must  I  scweam  now  ?  ' 
"Maude  made  a  genuine  success  in 
Fritz,  —  so  big  a  one,  in  fact,  that 
Mr.  Emmett  began  to  bill  her  on 
the  programme  as  '  Little  Maudie/ 
and  it  was  by  that  name  that 
she  was  known  out  West  through- 
out her  career  as  a  child  actress. 
After  her  engagement  with  Mr. 

13 


MAUDE     ADAMS 

Emmett  Maudie  was  engaged  to 
play  a  child's  part  in  A  Celebrated 
Case.  Most  of  her  scenes  in  that 
production  were  played  with  Miss 
Belle  Douglass,  who  was  cast  for 
a  very  important  part.  In  order 
to  be  prepared  for  any  emer- 
gency, Miss  Douglass  memorised 
Maudie's  lines  as  well  as  her  own. 
When  Maudie  discovered  this  she 
was  highly  indignant,  and  ex- 
claimed, '  You  need  n't  fret  about 
me ;  I  'm  all  right/  And  later, 
when  she  was  on  the  stage,  Miss 
Douglass  afterwards  told  me  that 
the  child  kept  pinching  her  ears  and 
whispering,  ( Don't  boffer  about  me. 
If  you  get  stuck  I  '11  help  you' 

H 


I 


MISS    MAUDE    ADAMS 
as  Dot  Bniflbery  in  "The  .Mi.lni.rlit  Hell.' 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

"  During  the  following  season  - 
Maudie  was  six  then  —  she  ap- 
peared with  B.  J.  Murphy  in  a 
play  called  Out  to  Nurse.  By  this 
time  the  young  lady  had  become 
quite  a  stickler  in  stage  affairs. 
Like  any  other  youngster  with  a 
healthy  appetite,  she  cordially  de- 
spised those  Barmecide  feasts 
known  as  stage  banquets.  Fre- 
quently, when  from  the  wings  she 
used  to  watch  me  acting  in  some 
play  in  which  there  was  an  elaborate 
dinner  or  supper  scene,  she  used  to 
say  to  me  when  I  came  off  the 
stage,  *  Yes,  muffer,  but  they  didn't 
give  you  nuffin  real  to  eat.'  Of 
course  stage  banquets  in  those  days 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

had  not  reached  their  present  state 
of  realism,  so  you  could  n't  blame 
Maudie  for  feeling  a  trifle  disap- 
pointed. But  her  first  opportunity 
to  express  her  sentiments  on  this 
matter  came  during  the  run  of  Out 
to  Nurse.  Mr.  Murphy  was  tre- 
mendously fond  of  the  child,  and 
used  to  pet  and  indulge  her  in 
loads  of  ways.  In  one  scene 
Maudie  had  to  bring  on  a  pitcher 
of  beer  to  Mr.  Murphy  and  some 
other  members  of  the  company, 
and  it  was  part  of  her  stage  busi- 
ness to  drink  with  them  to  the 
toast  of  *  'Ere 's  to  yer.'  Now,  be- 
fore Maudie  joined  the  company 
the  pitcher  had  always  been  filled 
16 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

with  cold  tea,  —  that  dreadful  dose 
which  passes  muster  on  the  stage 
for  anything  in  the  liquid  line 
from  sparkling  champagne  to 
deadly  poison,  —  but  with  the  little 
girl's  advent  there  began  a  new 
regime.  Maudie  would  not  stand 
for  that  cold-tea  business  at  all. 
She  went  to  Mr.  Murphy  and  told 
him  solemnly  but  most  emphati- 
cally that  unless  she  could  bring 
in  real  beer  in  the  pitcher  she 
would  n't  play  the  part  at  all.  I 
can  almost  hear  Mr.  Murphy 
laughing  at  her  yet  !  He  was 
immensely  tickled  at  the  serious 
way  in  which  she  had  made  her 
complaint. 


MA  U  D  E     AD  A  M  S 

"  <  Now  that 's  the  sort  of  a  lead- 
ing lady  I  like  to  have ! '  he  ex- 
claimed. '  She  wants  real  beer 
and  she  shall  have  real  beer/ 
"  And  real  beer  they  did  have  at 
every  performance  after  that. 
Although/'  laughingly  added  Mrs. 
Adams  in  telling  this  story,  "  for  the 
benefit  of  the  many  W.  C.  T.  U. 
admirers  that  my  daughter  has 
to-day  I  want  to  state  quite  clearly 
that  she  did  not  drink  any  of  the 
beer.  I  saw  to  that.  But  the 
others  did,  and  enjoyed  it  mightily 
after  their  long  cold-tea  drought ; 
and  every  night  when  they  came 
to  the  toast  one  or  another  of  the 
actors  would  wink  at  Maudie  and 

18 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

repeat,  <  'Ere  's  to  yer,'  under  their 
breath/' 

While  "Little  Maudie"  was  about 
seven  and  the  reigning  child  actress 
of  the  Pacific  Slope,  she  fell  by 
chance  under  the  management  of 
that  greatest  of  all  American  stage 
managers,  David  Belasco.  Prob- 
ably no  one  with  the  exception  of 
Mrs.  Adams  is  in  a  position  to 
speak  with  so  much  authority  on 
the  actress's  baby  career. 
"I  can  remember  the  first  time  I 
ever  saw  Maudie,"  said  Mr.  Be- 
lasco. "  I  was  the  stage  manager 
of  the  Baldwin  then :  James  A. 
Herne  and  I  were  playing  there 
together,  and  in  most  of  our  plays 

'9 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

there  was  usually  a  child's  part. 
Annie  Adams  I  had  known  for 
some  years  then  as  one  of  the  best 
character  actresses  of  the  West, 
but  my  first  remembrance  of 
the  present  Maude  Adams  is  of  a 
spindle-legged  little  girl,  unusually 
thin  and  tall  for  her  age,  with  a 
funny  little  pigtail  and  one  of  the 
quaintest  little  faces  you  ever  saw. 
In  those  days  I  don't  think  even 
her  mother,  who  doted  on  that 
child  as  I  have  never  known  a 
mother  to  dote  before,  —  I  don't 
think  even  she  considered  Maudie 
pretty  in  those  days.  But  even  in 
her  babyhood  there  was  a  magne- 
tism about  the  child,  —  some  traces 


20 


MISS    MAUDE    ADAMS 
as  Dot  Bradbury  in  "The  Midnight  Bell." 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

even  then  of  that  wonderfully  sweet 
and  charming  personality  which 
was  to  prove  such  a  tremendous 
advantage  to  her  in  the  later  years. 
The  child,  in  short,  was  a  born 
artist :  she  had  temperament.  She 
could  act  and  grasp  the  meaning 
of  a  part  long  before  she  was  able 
to  read.  When  we  were  begin- 
ning rehearsals  of  a  new  play  at 
the  Baldwin  I  would  take  Maudie 
on  my  knee  and  bit  by  bit  would 
explain  to  her  the  meaning  of  the 
part  she  had  to  play.  I  can  see 
her  now,  with  her  little  spindle 
legs  almost  touching  the  floor,  her 
tiny  face,  none  too  clean,  perhaps, 
peering  up  into  mine,  and  those 

21 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

wise  eyes  of  hers  drinking  in  every 
word.  I  soon  learned  to  know 
that  it  was  no  use  to  confine  myself 
to  a  description  of  her  own  work : 
until  I  had  told  the  whole  story 
of  the  play  to  Maudie,  and  treated 
her  almost  as  seriously  as  if  she 
were  our  leading  star,  she  would 
pay  no  attention.  She  was  serious- 
minded  in  her  own  childish  way 
even  in  those  days,  and  once  she 
realised  that  you  were  treating  her 
seriously  there  was  nothing  that 
that  child  would  not  try  to  do. 
But  first,  mind  you,  she  had  to 
know  the  story  of  the  play  and  all 
about  it.  When  the  parts  were 
given  out  to  the  company,  Mrs. 


22 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

Adams  was  always  letter  perfect  in 
Maudie's  lines  long  before  she 
attempted  to  learn  her  own.  Then 
bit  by  bit,  while  they  were  together 
in  the  dressing-room,  on  the  street 
cars,  or  at  their  home,  Mrs.  Adams 
would  teach  the  child  her  part. 
She  had  a  good  memory,  and  made 
what  we  of  the  stage  call  '  a  won- 
derfully quick  study/  But  to-day 
I  never  see  Maude  Adams  on  the 
stage  without  a  picture  rising  up 
before  me  of  that  patient,  hard- 
working, self-sacrificing  mother  of 
hers  drilling  the  child  in  one  of 
her  parts.  Stage  people,  with  all 
their  faults,  are  probably  the  warm- 
est-hearted in  the  world,  but  never 

23 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

in  all  my  long  experience  have  I 
seen  an  instance  of  such  unselfish, 
idolising  devotion  as  Mrs.  Adams 
displayed  for  her  little  girl.  Of 
course  it's  the  most  natural  thing 
in  the  world  for  any  mother  to 
love  her  child,  but  Mrs.  Adams' 
love  was  something  quite  out  of 
the  common.  We  were  all  mighty 
poor  in  those  times,  and  there  was 
many  a  week  in  those  San  Fran- 
cisco days  when  the  ghost  refused 
to  walk,  and  a  good  many  of  us 
went  hungry  in  consequence.  But 
in  spite  of  the  hardships  and  priva- 
tions which  we  all  faced  together, 
there  never  was  a  millionaire's 
daughter  more  zealously  guarded, 
24 


MISS    MAUDE   ADAMS 
as  Dora  in  "Men  and  Women. 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

more  tenderly  nurtured,  than 
Maudie  Adams  was  by  her  mother. 
No  sacrifice  was  too  great  for  her 
to  make.  Many  and  many  a  night, 
after  the  long  performances  and 
perhaps  a  whole  morning's  rehear- 
sals, I  have  seen  Mrs.  Adams  sitting 
up  till  daylight  working  over  some 
new  little  gown  for  Maudie.  I 
mean  it  in  all  seriousness  when  I 
say  that  whatever  Maude  Adams 
has  become  to-day  she  owes  entirely 
to  her  mother. 

"  One  of  the  biggest  successes  the 
child  scored  under  my  manage- 
ment was  as  little  Chrystal  in  a 
play  called  Chums,  which  I  had 
adapted  from  an  old  English  play 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

called  "The  Mariner's  Compass." 
James  A.  Herne  played  the  leading 
role  in  it,  and  later  on,  when  we 
parted  company,  he  played  in 
another  version  of  the  play  called 
Hearts  of  Oak.  But  the  char- 
acter of  Chrystal  figured  in  both 
versions ;  in  fact,  from  the  time 
Maude  Adams  created  the  role  it 
became  one  of  the  most  vital  parts 
of  the  play.  Chums,  in  short, 
scored  an  immense  success,  and 
4  Little  Maudie'  for  the  time 
being  was  the  heroine  of  the  town. 
But  those  spindle  legs  of  the  child 
had  a  most  unholy  way  of  grow- 
ing, and  at  last  there  came  a  bitter, 
never-to-be-forgotten  day  when 
26 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

'Little  Maudie' —  literally  kittle3 
no  longer  —  was  too  big  to  play 
children's  parts  any  more.  Her 
mother  sent  her  to  school,  and  I 
never  laid  eyes  on  *  Little  Maudie ' 
again  until  some  six  or  seven  years 
later.  I  had  started  on  my  career 
in  New  York  then,  and  dropped 
into  a  theatre  one  night  to  see 
Duncan  B.  Harrison  in  The  Pay- 
master. And  there,  sure  enough, 
was  '  Little  Maudie/  now  devel- 
oped into  a  charming  young  girl 
and  billed  as  *  Miss  Maude  Adams/ 
Her  part  in  the  play  was  rather  an 
important  one,  and  I  saw  at  once 
that  there  was  the  making  of  a 
charming  actress  in  her.  If  I  re- 
27 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

member  right,  Charles  Frohman 
saw  her  in  this  same  performance 
and  felt  as  I  did.  At  all  events, 
some  time  later,  when  he  was 
organising  a  stock  company  to 
play  Men  and  Women,  we  both 
thought  of  her  for  one  of  the  in- 
genues. But  then,  that  wasn't  so 
much  credit  to  us  either,  for  by 
that  time  Miss  Adams  had  already 
been  discovered  and  engaged  by 
Charles  Hoyt,  and  had  played  with 
great  success  at  the  Bijou  in  A 
Midnight  Bell. 

"  But  to  return  for  just  one  moment 
to  that  performance  of  The  Pay- 
master. There  was  one  scene  in 
the  play  where  Miss  Adams  was 
28 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

thrown  into  a  tank  of  real  water 
and  had  to  be  rescued  by  the  hero. 
I  should  explain  that  Maude  was 
now  quite  as  tall  as  her  mother,  and 
that  they  looked  remarkably  alike. 
When  I  saw  that  tank  scene  com- 
ing along  I  said  to  myself,  '  I  '11 
bet  you  Annie  Adams  will  never 
let  Maudie  jump  into  that  tank/ 
And  sure  enough,  when  the  climax 
came,  I,  being  up  to  all  the  tricks 
of  the  stage,  saw  that  it  was  Mrs. 
Adams  who  took  the  plunge,  not 
Maude.  '  Ah ! '  said  I  to  myself, 
'  that 's  the  same  old  Annie  Adams  ; 
and  afterwards,  when  I  went  behind 
to  say  <  how  de  do '  to  them  both, 
Mrs.  Adams  exclaimed  at  once, 
29 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

'Why,  of  course  it  was  me  that 
jumped  in  the  tank ;  do  you  think 
for  an  instant  that  I  would  allow 
Maudie  to  run  the  risk  of  catching 
her  death  of  cold?" 


30 


Miss    MAUDE    ADAMS 
as  Nell  in  "  The  Lost  Paradise.' 


MA  U  D  E      ADAMS 


Part  Second 


MAUDE  ADAMS  fin- 
ished her  career  as  a 
child  actress  at  the  age 
of  ten,  and  for  four  years  she  studied 
in  the  Presbyterian  Collegiate  Insti- 
tute at  Salt  Lake  City,  her  old 
home.  Her  stage  training  as  a 
child  had  made  her  not  only  a 
"quick  study"  in  the  matter  of 
theatrical  roles,  but  in  her  lessons  as 
well.  At  fourteen  she  had  accom- 
plished so  much  that  she  was  within 
a  year  of  graduating,  but  one  day, 
succumbing  to  a  fit  of  combined 
home,  stage,  and  mother  sickness, 

31 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

she  wrote  to  her  mother  begging 
her  to  let  her  return  to  her  old 
work.  Mrs,  Adams  has  that  letter 
to-day. 

"  It 's  no  use  my  studying  any  more, 
mother,"  she  wrote.  "  In  fact,  it 's 
all  nonsense  unless  I  'm  to  go  into 
literature  or  am  to  be  a  teacher. 
But  I  want  to  go  on  the  stage 
again,  so  that  I  may  be  with 
you." 

That  letter  was  too  much  for  Mrs. 
Adams  ;  she  succumbed  to  its  en- 
treaties :  the  girl  left  school  and 
returned  to  her  mother.  But  the 
stage  life  she  was  so  anxious  to 
begin  again  she  found  to  be  quite 
another  story  from  what  it  had  been 
32 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

in  the  old  days.  "  Little  Maudie  " 
had  been  a  popular  idol  in  her 
small  way ;  Maude  Adams  now 
found  herself  a  mere  nonentity,  to 
her  professional  friends  merely 
"Annie  Adams'  daughter/'  a 
nonentity  very  young  and  very 
crude,  with  all  her  work  lying 
before  her.  And  it  was  hard  and 
bitter  work  at  that.  The  mother's 
standing  as  an  actress  could  do  little 
more  for  her  at  first  than  to  secure 
for  her  some  temporary  engage- 
ments as  an  extra  girl.  But  the 
girl's  mind,  always  of  a  serious 
trend,  set  to  work  in  earnest.  She 
studied,  she  watched,  she  learned 
many  parts.  All  that  her  mother 

3  33 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

knew  of  the  art  of  acting  had  been 
taught  to  the  girl  already,  and  in 
the  meantime  there  was  nothing  to 
be  done  but  bide  her  chance,  and 
gain  meanwhile  that  bitterest  of  all 
fruits  —  experience.  Mrs.  Adams' 
faith  in  her  girl's  future  never 
wavered  for  an  instant.  Theatrical 
affairs  in  the  West  had  reached  a 
very  low  ebb  :  the  eyes  of  every 
Western  actor  and  actress  were  then 
turned,  as  always,  towards  the  Thes- 
pian's Mecca  —  New  York. 
Finally,  mother  and  daughter 
reached  there,  and  Maude  Adams 
secured  her  first  Eastern  engage- 
ment in  The  Paymaster  a  melo- 
drama which  was  put  on  for  a  run 

34 


MISS    MAITDE    ADAMS 
as  Suzanne  in  "The  Masked  Ball." 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

at  the  Star.  After  that  for  a  very 
short  time  she  played  small  parts 
in  E.  H.  Sothern's  company,  and 
then  came  her  first  real  metropoli- 
tan opportunity,  —  Charles  Hoyt 
engaged  her  to  create  the  role  of 
the  young  schoolmistress  in  A 
Midnight  Bell.  The  play  was  a 
great  success  at  the  Bijou  and  en- 
joyed a  long  run,  but  in  looking 
through  the  newspaper  reviews 
of  the  performance  the  fact  is 
apparent  that  the  public  found  out 
and  appreciated  Maude  Adams  as 
an  artist  long  before  the  critics  did. 
A  number  of  the  reviewers  made 
no  mention  of  her  performance; 
others  dismissed  her  with  a  compli- 

35 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 


mentary  line.  Her  role  in  the  play, 
after  all,  was  a  subordinate  one ; 
but  somehow  or  other  that  indefin- 
able charm  of  personality  that  has 
done  more  to  make  Maude  Adams 
the  popular  idol  that  she  is  to-day 
than  all  her  technique  and  grace 
and  cleverness,  began  to  exert  its 
spell  over  her  audiences.  In  a  few 
days,  in  all  parts  of  the  town,  at  the 
clubs,  in  the  bar-rooms,  on  the  street 
cars,  people  began  to  ask  each  other, 
"  Have  you  seen  that  new  little  girl 
in  Hoyt's  play  at  the  Bijou? 
She's  sweet." 

A    Midnight    Bell  was    the    most 

tender    and    one    of   the    cleverest 

plays  which  the  late  Charles  Hoyt 

36 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

ever  turned  out,  but  it  is  no  injus- 
tice, either  to  its  author  or  the 
other  members  of  the  cast,  to 
say  that  to  hundreds  of  playgoers 
the  one  memory  of  that  perform- 
ance is  Maude  Adams'  portrayal 
of  the  young  New  England  girl. 
She  had  hit  the  theatrical  bull's- 
eye  squarely,  and  scored  One. 
At  the  end  of  the  run  of  A  Mid- 
night Bell,  —  or  rather,  at  the 
conclusion  of  its  New  York  en- 
gagement, for,  as  a  matter  of  fact, 
the  piece  is  running  yet,  —  Miss 
Adams  found  herself  face  to  face 
with  a  very  serious  proposition. 
She  had  to  choose  between  two 
offers.  Her  success  in  his  farce 

37 


M  A  U  D  E     ADAMS 

comedy  had  so  delighted  Mr.  Hoyt 
that  he  was  practically  willing  to 
let  her  name  her  own  terms  if  she 
would  sign  a  five  years'  contract 
with  him.  It  was  a  fascinating 
offer  from  one  point  of  view :  it 
meant  lots  of  money;  but  farce 
comedy  held  little  charm  for  the 
girl  who  had  set  her  heart  and  fixed 
her  ambition  on  far  more  serious 
work.  On  the  other  hand,  there 
was  a  more  moderate  offer  from 
Charles  Frohman,  who  was  then 
getting  ready  to  found  his  stock 
company  at  the  Twenty-Third 
Street  Theatre.  The  first  piece 
was  to  be  Men  and  Women,  a 
play  by  De  Mille  and  her  old 

38 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

friend,  David  Belasco.  There  was 
a  small  part  in  it  for  her,  Mr.  Froh- 
man  said,  and  later  on  there  would 
be  others.  The  girl  never  hesitated 
for  a  moment :  then  and  there  she 
turned  her  back  upon  farce  comedy 
for  ever,  and  she  and  Charles  Froh- 
man  that  morning  signed  a  con- 
tract that  has  extended  to  this  day. 
Charles  Frohman,  although  at  that 
time  he  had  not  acquired  one-tenth 
of  the  immense  power  and  influence 
in  theatrical  affairs  which  he  exerts 
to-day,  was  already  known  as  a 
manager  of  remarkable  astuteness ; 
but  it  is  safe  to  say  that  neither  he 
nor  Miss  Adams,  in  their  wildest 
and  most  ambitious  dreams,  realised 

39 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

what  a  huge  amount  of  fame  and 
fortune  the  signing  of  that  piece  of 
paper  meant  to  both  of  them :  for 
waiving  Miss  Adams'  claims  as  an 
artist  entirely  aside,  it  is  an  accepted 
fact  to-day  that,  regarded  merely  as 
a  business  proposition,  a  drawing 
card,  no  American  star,  however 
much  greater  her  histrionic  powers 
might  be,  has  ever  had  so  tremen- 
dous and  widespread  a  popularity  as 
Maude  Adams  enjoys  in  the  United 
States  to-day.  In  many  communi- 
ties this  popularity  has  amounted 
almost  to  a  mania,  which  blinds  her 
audiences  absolutely  to  her  faults 
and  grossly  exaggerates  even  her 
greatest  charms.  In  fact,  it  is 
4o 


MISS    MAUDE    ADAMS 
as  Miriam  in  "Butterflies." 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

no  exaggeration  to  say  that  there 
are  hundreds  of  playgoers  in  New 
York  and  all  the  other  American 
cities  to-day  who  would  accept 
little  Miss  Adams  seriously — aye, 
and  enthusiastically,  too  —  if  she 
attempted  to  play  Lady  Macbeth. 
This  much  is  certain,  however,  that 
when  he  signed  that  contract  Mr. 
Frohman  realised  that  in  Maude 
Adams  he  had  gained  an  uncom- 
monly clever  actress.  He  said  so 
at  the  time,  and  later  on  when  he 
picked  her  out  to  be  his  new  star, 
John  Drew's  leading  woman,  and 
still  later  when  he  chose  that  she 
should  be  sent  out  as  a  star  on  her 
own  account,  he  persisted  in  the 

41 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

face  of  the  most  active  opposition 
from  all  his  would-be  counsellors 
and  real  friends  that  he  knew  what 
he  was  about  and  was  going  to 
make  her  the  most  popular  star 
in  the  theatrical  firmament. 
He  was  wise  enough  not  to  push 
her  to  the  front  too  soon.  He 
placed  her  in  the  stock  company, 
where  the  training  of  Belasco  did 
worlds  for  her  artistic  develop- 
ment. In  his  first  play,  Men  and 
Women,  she  had  a  small  part,  which 
counted  for  very  little  against  the 
superior  roles  which  fell  to  the 
share  of  Miss  Sydney  Armstrong 
and  Miss  Odette  Tyler.  In  the 
next,  Belasco  and  De  Mille  play, 
42 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

however,  she  had  better  luck.  Be- 
lasco  had  taken  her  measure,  and 
Frohman  had  been  particular  in  ask- 
ing that  the  new  play  should  contain 
a  role  which  would  give  her  an  op- 
portunity. The  result  was  Nell,  the 
lame  girl,  in  The  Lost  Paradise,  — 
a  charming  role,  which  showed  for 
the  first  time  what  Miss  Adams 
could  do  in  the  way  of  pathos. 
Meanwhile,  Charles  Frohman  had 
been  reaching  out  in  other  direc- 
tions, and  one  fine  morning  the 
town  awoke  to  read  the  announce- 
ment that  John  Drew  had  at  last 
forsworn  his  eighteen  years'  alle- 
giance to  the  Daly  standard,  and 
had  gone  over  to  the  enemy  — 

43 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

which,  in  Daly's  Theatre,  meant 
Charles  Frohman  with  a  large  C 
and  a  capital  F.  Then  came  the 
almost  equally  important  question, 
Who  would  be  John  Drew's  lead- 
ing woman  ?  To  the  playgoers  of 
ten  years  ago  who  had  seen  Mr. 
Drew  making  perpetual  stage  love 
to  Miss  Ada  Rehan  for  twelve  full 
seasons  it  was  almost  impossible  to 
imagine  another  woman  attempting 
to  usurp  her  place,  and  quite  pre- 
posterous to  conceive  of  any  actress 
equalling  her  in  that  capacity.  So, 
finally,  when  the  announcement 
came  that  Mr.  Frohman  had  se- 
lected Maude  Adams  to  support 
Drew,  there  was  an  almost  universal 

44 


MISS    MAUDE    ADAMS 
as  Dora  in  "Christopher,  Jr." 


M  A  U  D  E     ADAMS 

cry  of:  "What,  that  little  thing! 
Oh,  how  absurd !  What  tommy 
rot !  " 

Finally,  the  first  night  came  Oc- 
tober 3,  1892,  a  night  which,  as 
Trilby  would  say,  ought  to  be 
marked  with  a  white  stone.  It 
probably  is  in  Miss  Adams*  memory. 
The  theatre  was  Palmer's,  the  play 
The  Masked  Ball,  an  adaptation 
from  the  French  by  Clyde  Fitch ; 
the  house  was  jammed  to  the  doors 
by  all  the  old  Daly  clientele  who 
had  come  to  stand  or  fall  with 
Drew  in  this  his  first  venture  out- 
side the  Daly  fold.  John  Drew 
was  a  success,  and  so  was  the  play, 
but  —  tell  it  not  in  Gath  !  —  a  hit 

45 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

was  scored  that  night  which  was 
greater  than  both  of  theirs  rolled 
together.  Maude  Adams  scored 
that  hit.  Mr.  Drew  had  a  good 
part,  and  he  played  it  admirably. 
In  fact,  his  performance  that  night 
established  conclusively  his  right  to 
be  a  star.  But  it  was  not  to  John 
Drew  that  the  biggest  opportunity 
came  that  night.  The  following 
paragraph,  clipped  from  one  of  the 
criticisms  of  The  Masked  Ball  the 
following  day,  fully  explains  the 
situation.  This  article  said  :  — 
"  But  the  great  situation  of  the  play 
does  not  fall  to  Mr.  Drew's  share. 
Miss  Maude  Adams,  a  young  actress 
who  until  last  evening  had  only 

46 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

been  seen  in  minor  roles,  fairly 
shared  the  honours  with  Mr.  Drew. 
"  Her  performance  was  a  revelation. 
There  is  one  scene  in  the  second 
act  where  in  order  to  punish  her 
husband  for  some  antenuptial  re- 
marks of  his  she  has  to  pretend 
that  she  is  drunk.  It  was  just 
touch  and  go  whether  this  scene 
ruined  the  play  or  not.  It  would 
have  been  hard  to  devise  a  more 
crucial  test  for  an  actress  of  even  the 
widest  experience  and  the  greatest 
skill.  In  order  to  carry  off  this 
scene  successfully  it  was  necessary 
for  the  wife  to  appear  to  be  drunk 
and  yet  be  a  gentlewoman  at  the 
same  time. 

47 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

"  Miss  Adams  achieved  this  feat,  — 
achieved  it  so  successfully  that  the 
applause  lasted  for  a  full  two  min- 
utes after  she  made  her  exit.  If 
Miss  Adams  had  done  nothing  else 
throughout  the  entire  play  than  that 
one  scene  it  would  have  stamped 
her  as  a  comedienne  of  the  first 
water.  But  her  scenes  of  tender- 
ness were  equally  good,  and  her 
alternate  raillery  and  contrition  for 
her  artifice  in  the  final  scene  were 
rendered  with  a  delightfully  deli- 
cate touch/' 

Maude  Adams'  drunken  scene  was 
as  great  a  topic  of  conversation  in 
'92  as  Irene  Van  Brugh's  sen- 
sational performance  of  Sophie 


MA  UP  E      ADAMS 


Fulgarney  "  in  The  Gay  Lord 
has  been  in  1901.  The  almost 
insurmountable  difficulties  which 
the  part  offered  only  served  to 
make  Miss  Adams'  triumph  all 
the  greater. 

To  sum  the  matter  up,  Maude 
Adams  found  herself  enjoying  the 
double  distinction  of  being  the 
youngest  leading  lady  on  the  boards 
and  the  only  actress  who  had  been 
promoted  to  the  galaxy  of  theatri- 
cal celebrities  because  she  did  n't 
keep  sober. 

The  tipsy  act,  which  excited  the 
admiration  of  the  critics  on  the 
first  night  of  the  performance, 
with  its  dainty  and  ludicrous  mim- 
4  49 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

icry,  its  delicate  but  irresistible 
drollery,  was  a  more  dangerous 
and  difficult  thing  to  do  than  is 
apparent  to  the  careless  observer. 
The  spectacle  of  a  drunken  woman 
on  the  stage  is  revolting  and  coarse 
to  a  degree,  and  offensive  to  the 
good  taste  of  a  cultured  audience. 
But  this  woman  is  a  lady  of  grace 
and  refinement,  young  and  beauti- 
ful, and  in  reality  not  tipsy  at  all, 
but  acting  the  part  to  punish  her 
husband,  who,  previous  to  their 
marriage,  to  intercept  the  advances 
of  another  aspirant  to  her  hand, 
had  in  his  anxiety  warned  off  the 
other  suitor  by  declaring  that  the 
lady  had  inherited  an  appetite  for 

5° 


MISS    MAUDE    ADAMS   WITH    JOHN    DREW 
as  Mrs.  Demiant  ami  Mr.  Kilroy  iu  "The  Squire  of  Dames." 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

intoxicants  from  her  father,  a  most 
worthy  and  temperate  man. 
The  kindly  fate  which  caters  to 
the  farce  dramatist  brings  the  old 
suitor  and  the  wife  together  at  a 
masked  ball  to  which  she  has  gone 
without  her  husband's  knowledge, 
and  in  company  with  a  respectable 
but  easily  influenced  old  party,  - 
her  husband's  partner, — whose 
wife,  too,  is  in  ignorance  of  his  at- 
tendance at  the  masked  revel,  but 
suspicious  from  finding  his  pockets 
filled  with  confetti,  and  jealous  of 
the  young  wife.  To  add  to  the 
comical  predicament  and  perplex- 
ity of  the  play,  of  course  the  old 
suitor  tells  the  wife  of  her  hus- 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

band's  accusation,  and  she  resolves 
to  revenge  herself  by  appearing  to 
be  the  victim  of  the  vice  of  which 
he  has  accused  her. 
It  is  upon  the  scene  following  the 
revelation  of  the  suitor  to  the  hus- 
band that  he  has  met  the  wife,  the 
pretty  "  Susanne,"  at  the  ball,  and 
when  the  older  woman,  Madame 
Poulet,  is  endeavouring  to  obtain 
satisfactory  explanation  of  her 
husband's  conduct,  which  he  is 
endeavouring  not  to  give,  that  the 
tipsy  wife  comes  reeling  out  of  her 
dressing-room  with  her  salubrious : 
"  Good-morning,  Paul !  Hello, 
Paulie  !  '  and,  with  a  little  lurch 
and  uncertain  and  dizzy  steps,  ap- 


M  A  UP  E     ADAMS 

proaches  the  irate  Madame  Poulet 
with  the  deliciously  funny  : 
"  Ah,  Madame  Foulet !  Your  hus- 
band is  a  nice  man,  is  n't  he  ?  A 
very  n-nice  man ;  but  he  can't 
d-dance  very  well.  I  think  he 
has  too  many  f-feet."  Then, 
turning  to  her  horrified  husband 
with  a  maudlin  and  vacant  smile, 
she  adds,  "  Ah  !  but  he  holds  you 
so  well !  " 

"  Where  were  you  last  night  ? " 
demands  the  furious  husband. 
"  Why,  really,"  with  a  careless 
little  laugh,  "I  —  I  don't  know  !  " 
It  is  a  risky  question,  and  .she  real- 
ises it,  and,  slurring  her  answer, 
she  reels,  sways,  and  sinks  into  a 

53 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

chair  with  a  funny  and  puzzled 
"  I  think  I  '11  have  to  sit  down  a 
minute." 

The  delicate  and  slight  physique 
of  the  actress,  the  small  and  spirit- 
uelle  face  framed  in  fair  hair,  the 
low,  sweet  voice  and  pretty  Eng- 
lish accent,  above  all  the  tacit 
understanding  which  the  actress 
establishes  between  herself  and  her 
audience  that  she  is  n't  really  in- 
toxicated, the  mischievous  delight 
she  manages  to  convey  to  them  at 
the  despair  of  her  husband,  and 
the  success  of  her  scheme  of  re- 
venge all  unite  in  saving  the  comi- 
cal mimicry  of  inebriety  from  the 
slightest  approach  to  coarseness. 

54 


MISS    MAUDE    ADAMS 
as  Jessie  Kt-W  in  "The  Kuible  Sh 


MA  U  D  E      ADAMS 

The  daintiness  of  her  roguishness 
was  emphasised,  too,  by  a  soft  and 
simple  gown  of  pink  brocade,  over- 
hung with  floating  draperies  of 
chiffon  and  girdled  beneath  the 
bust  in  Directoire  fashion. 
She  carried  a  single  long-stemmed 
flower  in  her  hand,  waving  it  about 
with  aimless  grace,  and  when  at 
the  close  of  the  scene  she  ex- 
claimed, "  You  don't  know  how 
I  want  a  d-drink  of  water,"  with  a 
last  little  sick  and  dizzy  glide  and  a 
desperate  effort  to  right  herself,  the 
storm  of  applause  breaks  out. 
"It  wasn't  easy  to  do,"  said  Miss 
Adams  in  an  interview  at  the 
time. 

55 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

"  You  see,  I  could  n't  get  tipsy  my- 
self to  make  my  conception  of  the 
part,  for  when  you  are  really  in- 
toxicated you  don't  know  how  you 
do  feel,  and  can't  remember  what 
you  do  at  all  afterward,  —  at  least,  so 
the  gentlemen  say.  And  I  did  n't 
dare  to  study  the  part  from  really 
tipsy  women,  because  I  would 
overdo  it  then  and  shock  people. 
"  Besides,  I  am  not  really  drunken 
in  the  piece.  No,  I  must  study  it 
as  a  sober  woman  trying  to  act  in- 
toxicated, and  yet  never  deceiving 
my  audience  for  a  minute  as  to 
the  truth.  So  I  thought  over  it, 
dreamed  over  it,  acted  it  out  before 
the  mirror  over  and  over  for  weeks 

56 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

entirely  through  my  imagination. 
Indeed,  you  might  call  the  whole 
business  a  flight  of  tipsy  imagina- 
tion. 

"  For  really,  you  know,  it  is  not  at 
all  like  me,  though  I  am  fond  of 
comedy.  My  old  friends  wonder 
at  it.  One  of  the  ladies  of  the 
Sothern  company  said  to  me, 
'Why,  whatever  has  gotten  into 
you  ?  You  never  used  to  touch  a 
drop  with  us ! '  and  I  told  her  I 
had  gone  to  the  demnition  bow- 
wows and  was  tipsy  every  night 


now." 


In  the  same  interview  Miss  Adams, 

in  speaking  of  herself,  said  :  — 

"  I    made    my  first  appearance  on 

57 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

the  stage  at  nine  months  old. 
Was  I  sober?  Yes,  exceedingly 
sober  and  dignified,  they  say.  I 
can't  quite  remember.  A  little 
later,  before  I  was  five,  I  played 
child  parts  with  Emmett,  and  then 
they  put  me  at  school  in  a  Presby- 
terian college.  I  stayed  until  I 
was  fourteen ;  then  I  came  back 
to  the  stage  again,  to  have  my 
dreams  cruelly  disturbed,  my  hopes 
dashed. 

"  The  stage  I  loved  would  have 
nothing  to  do  with  me.  I  was  too 
old  for  child  parts,  too  young  for 
mature  parts.  I  was  tall  and  small 
and  thin,  —  have  n't  quite  gotten 
over  that  yet,  —  and  I  was  hopelessly 
58 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

bashful.  Mrs.  Sothern,  who  played 
child  parts  with  me,  interested 
Mr.  Sothern  in  me  after  a  while. 
He  invited  me  out  to  dinner  with 
them  once,  I  remember.  I  couldn't 
speak  a  word,  I  was  so  diffident.  I 
think  he  was  disgusted,  but  after- 
ward he  helped  me. 
"  Really,  the  first  lines  I  had  given 
to  me  were  written  in  for  me,  and 
when  my  cue  came  I  could  n't 
make  a  sound,  so  the  rest  went  on 
without  me.  But  I  believe  the 
only  way  to  study  for  the  stage  is 
on  the  stage.  If  I  had  gone  to 
school  as  they  wanted  me  to  until 
now,  I  could  n't  bend  myself  to  the 
life  as  I  do  now.  I  would  have 

59 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

been  formed,  you  see.  There  are 
no  schools  of  acting  here  to  study 
in  like  those  of  France. 
"  You  don't  get  the  practical  work 
in  our  schools,  and  it  is  very  hard 
now  to  get  a  dramatic  education 
on  the  stage.  Opportunities  are 
accidents,  and  even  when  they  come, 
runs  are  so  long  that  versatility  is 
not  easy  to  attain.  We  need  a 
school  of  acting  here  very  much, 
but  it  must  be  a  theatre,  not  a  col- 
lege. You  see,  with  the  practical 
work  of  the  stage  for  a  foundation 
you  can  study  those  other  things 
yourself.  I  am  working  like  an 
undergraduate  at  French,  and  learn- 
ing to  play  on  the  harp.  I  mean 
60 


MISS   MAl'DK    ADAMS    WITH    JOHN    DREW 
as  Dolly  and  Sir  Jasper  in  "  Rosemary." 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

to  introduce  it  in  a  play  sometime. 
Mr.  De  Mille  said  when  I  could 
play  the  harp  he  would  write  the 
scene.  Ah,  but  I  had  a  beautiful 
scene  all  dreamed  out !  —  a  young 
man  looking  love  at  me  over  that 
hollow  place  in  the  top, — the  slope, 
you  know.  But  when  my  teacher 
came  he  told  me  I  was  sitting  at 
the  wrong  end  of  the  harp,  and 
away  went  my  scene. 
"  I  study  plays  all  the  time,  too, 
Shakespeare  first,  —  not  that  I  ever 
intend  to  play  tragedy,  but  he's 
the  standard,  —  and  other  plays  I 
read  and  study,  too,  make  scenes, 
and  put  myself  in  situations." 
So  great  was  the  success  of  The 
61 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

Masked  Ball  that  nearly  eighteen 
months  elapsed  before  Mr.  Drew 
found  it  necessary  to  produce 
another  play.  This  time  it  was  a 
light  comedy  by  Henry  Guy 
Carleton  called  Butterflies.  Miss 
Adams  nominally  played  the  lead- 
ing part  in  it,  but  it  was  a  dread- 
fully conventional  part,  which 
offered  her  no  real  opportunity,  and 
the  play  had  been  so  constructed 
that  the  soubrette  role,  played  most 
excellently  by  Miss  Olive  May, 
carried  off  all  the  honours.  During 
the  next  season  Miss  Adams  scored 
heavily  by  her  exquisite  perform- 
ance of  Jessie  in  Henry  Arthur 
Jones'  play,  The  Bauble  Shop. 
62 


MAUDE     ADAMS 

In  The  Bauble  Shop  Lord  Clive- 
brooke,  the  young  leader  of  the 
House  of  Commons,  meets  Jessie 
Keber,  a  toy  maker's  daughter.  At 
the  outset  his  intentions  towards 
her  are  not  honourable.  He  visits 
her  at  night  in  her  father's  shop, 
but  as  the  purity  of  the  girl's  nature 
reveals  itself  to  him  it  shames  him. 
He  decides  to  leave  her  alone.  On 
the  night  of  their  last  meeting  they 
are  discovered  by  Stoach,  the  leader 
of  the  opposition.  A  bill  with 
regard  to  public  morality  is  to  be 
introduced  into  the  House  by  Clive- 
brooke  on  the  following  day. 
Stoach  declares  that  he  will  brand 
Clivebrooke  as  a  libertine  before  all 

63 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

the  House  unless  he  agrees  to  with- 
draw the  bill.  Clivebrooke  refuses. 
The  next  act  takes  place  in  the 
lobby  of  the  House.  Stoach  circu- 
lates the  report  with  regard  to 
Clivebrooke.  Clivebrooke's  father 
and  his  constituents  hurry  to  the 
room  to  hear  his  denial.  Clive- 
brooke is  unable  to  deny  that  he 
was  in  the  toy  shop,  but  declares 
his  intention  of  making  the  girl 
his  wife. 

There  was  one  scene  in  this  play 
where  Jessie  described  to  her  father 
the  beautiful  home  that  her  lover, 
Clivebrooke,  is  making  for  her  in 
which  Miss  Adams  fairly  excelled. 
From  the  mad  raillery  of  Suzanne 


MISS    MAUDE    ADAMS 
as  I^dy  Bnbbie  in  "  The  Little  Minister.' 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

in  The  Masked  Ball  to  the  sim- 
plicity and  pathos  of  Jessie  Keber 
was  a  wide  artistic  leap,  but  Miss 
Adams  accomplished  it  most  suc- 
cessfully. 

The  following  season  John  Drew 
produced  another  play  by  Henry 
Guy  Carleton,  —  That  Imprudent 
Young  Couple.  It  was  a  failure, 
but  it  gave  Miss  Adams  another 
chance  to  do  clever  work  in  a  new 
role.  Indeed,  Miss  Adams  had 
good  reason  to  congratulate  her- 
self on  this  occasion,  for  she  and 
Mr.  Frank  Lamb,  who  played  the 
butler,  were  the  only  members  of 
the  company  who  escaped  from 
the  critics  with  whole  skins.  One 
~7~  65 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

t 

New  York  reviewer  wrote  on  the 
following  day:  — 
"  The  story  is  old,  the  plot  is  un- 
interesting, and  the  part  of  the 
hero  is  an  exceptionally  fine  speci- 
men of  the  genus  Cad.  The  char- 
acter of  the  young  wife  is  scarcely 
a  degree  better  than  that  of  the 
husband,  and  that  Miss  Adams  was 
able  to  interest  her  audience  at  all 
last  night  was  due  entirely  to  the 
charm  of  her  own  personality.  It 
is  good  to  see  that  the  remark- 
able success  which  has  come  to  this 
young  actress  in  the  last  three 
years  has  not  turned  her  head. 
Her  work  is  still  exceptional  in  its 
daintiness  and  its  simplicity. 
66 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

"  Her  work  has  grown  in  many 
ways  during  the  past  year.  At 
present  Miss  Adams  is  easily  the 
most  accomplished  and  womanly 
artist  of  all  the  younger  actresses. 
She  has  found  the  short  cut  which 
leads  from  laughter  into  tears,  and 
although  last  night  she  had  only 
one  chance  to  show  her  power  in 
this  respect  in  a  neatly  worded  lit- 
tle homily  on  the  poverty  of  the 
genteel  poor,  she  availed  herself 
of  it. 

"  All  the  honors — such  as  they  were 
—  of  last  night's  performance  be- 
longed to  Miss  Adams." 
It  was  found  necessary  to  make  a 
change  of  bill  at  once,  and  Chris- 
67 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

topher,  Jr.,  a  rollicking  little  com- 
edy by  Madeleine  Lucette  Ryley, 
which  Mr.  Drew  had  produced  on 
the  road  during  the  previous  season, 
but  which  he  had  feared  was  not 
quite  strong  enough  to  endure  a 
New  York  run,  was  substituted  for 
The  Imprudent  Young  Couple.  The 
change  was  a  great  success,  and 
the  little  comedy  set  the  whole 
town  laughing.  There  was  one 
scene  in  this  play  which  I  have 
always  thought  the  most  beautiful 
piece  of  acting  that  Maude  Adams 
had  ever  done.  I  saw  the  play  for 
the  first  time  the  season  previous  to 
its  run  at  the  Empire  over .  in  that 
gaunt  old  mausoleum  of  a  theatre, 

68 


MAUDE     ADAMS 

the  Columbia,  in  Brooklyn,  where 
Mr.  Drew  was  quietly,  to  quote 
the  vernacular,  "  trying  it  on  the 
dog."  The  details  of  the  plot 
have  escaped  my  memory,  but  that 
one  little  episode  stands  out  as  clear 
as  day.  In  this  scene,  Miss  Adams, 
broken-hearted  at  the  prospect  of  a 
long  parting  from  her  lover,  sits 
down  at  the  piano  and  sings  for 
him  at  his  request.  The  song  was 
Torti's  "  Good-bye/'  She  struggled 
through  those  first  lines,  — 

"  Falling  leaf  on  fading  tree, 
Lines  of  white  on  a  sullen  sea, 
Shadows  rising  —  " 

and  then  gradually,  note  by  note, 
her  voice  began  to  fail  a  little ;  a 

69 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

lump  crept  into  one's  own  throat 
from  sheer  sympathy,  and  then  with 
a  sudden  crash  and  a  sob  down  went 
her  head  upon  the  music  rack, 
and  actress  and  audience  wept 
metaphorically  on  each  other's 
shoulders. 

That  huge  theatre  was  almost 
empty  that  night,  but  for  all  that 
the  small  audience  fairly  got  up  on 
its  hind  legs  and  fired  salvoes  after 
salvoes  of  applause  at  the  actress. 
The  run  of  Christopher,  Jr.,  at  the 
Empire  lasted  until  the  following 
February,  when  Mr.  Drew  moved 
to  the  Garrick  and  presented  an 
adaptation  by  R.  C.  Carton  of  Du- 
mas fils'  "  L'Ami  des  Femmes." 

70 


MISS    MAUDE    ADAMS 
as  Ladv  B.ibbie  in  "  T!u>  Little  Minister.' 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

In  its  English  dress  it  was  known 
as  The  Squire  of  Dames.  There 
was  a  very  effective  part  for  Mr. 
Drew  in  it,  but  Miss  Adams,  cast 
for  the  role  of  a  rather  flippant  and 
heartless  young  society  matron, 
came  as  close  to  scoring  a  failure 
as  she  ever  did  in  her  life.  It  was 
not  her  fault ;  she  was  miscast,  that 
was  all,  and  all  the  women  theatre- 
goers, with  whom  Maude  Adams 
had  already  become  a  mania  of  the 
first  water,  laid  the  entire  blame  for 
the  tiny  fiasco  upon  a  dress  which 
Miss  Adams  wore  in  the  principal 
scene.  Poor  luckless  frock !  How 
the  fashion  writers  and  women's 
departments  did  tear  that  unfor- 

71 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

tunate  garment  to  pieces !  Miss 
Adams  has  since  laughingly  ex- 
plained that  she  never  could  under- 
stand what  there  was  about  the 
gown  to  call  forth  such  a  volley 
of  onslaughts,  but,  as  a  matter  of 
fact,  the  women  who  went  there  to 
dote  and  gloat  over  their  favourite 
actress  were  disappointed  at  not  find- 
ing her  in  as  good  a  role  as  usual, 
and,  consequently,  their  sense  of  jus- 
tice and  loyalty  not  permitting  them 
to  "roast  "  the  actress,  they  had  re- 
lieved their  feelings  by  taking  away 
the  character  of  her  frock. 
Early  in  the  following  September 
Mr.  Drew  produced  Rosemary,  and 
Maude  Adams'  popularity  grew 
72 


MA  UP E      ADAMS 

suddenly  from  a  fad  into  a  furore. 
Mr.  Drew  scored  a  notable  success 
as  Sir  Jasper,  but  it  was  Maude 
Adams'  Dorothy  Cruickshank  that 
made  the  great  success. 
As  for  the  play,  it  was  charming. 
As  sweet  and  wholesome  as  the 
little  plant  whose  name  it  bears, 
Rosemary  triumphed  uncondition- 
ally. Messrs.  Louis  N.  Parker  and 
Murray  Carson  had  turned  out  a 
remarkable  piece  of  stagecraft.  It 
was  a  love  story  pure  and  simple, 
and  yet  it  was  more  than  that.  In 
dialogue  and  action  it  was  high 
comedy  of  the  first  water.  There 
was  not  a  superfluous  phrase  nor  a 
strained  situation  in  it,  and  children 

73 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

might  take  their  grandmothers  to 
see  it  without  fear  of  arousing  the 
slightest  blush.  The  play  opens  in 
the  wet. 

Miss  Dorothy  Cruickshank  and 
Master  William  Westwood,  an 
eloping  couple,  aged  eighteen  and 
twenty,  have  come  to  grief  in  the 
mud.  Their  chaise  has  broken 
down.  Sir  Jasper  Thorndyke,  out- 
side of  whose  gate  the  accident  has 
occurred,  comes  to  their  rescue. 
He  puts  them  up  for  the  night  — 
the  boy  in  the  Pink  room,  the  girl 
in  the  Blue.  Later  a  blustering 
sea  captain  and  his  wife  also  take 
refuge  from  the  storm,  and  it  isn't 
until  they  are  also  safely  installed 

74 


MISS    MAUDE    ADAMS 
as  Ixi.lv  Babble  in  "The  Little  Minister.' 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

for  the  night  that  Sir  Jasper  real- 
ises that  they  are  the  parents  of  the 
would-be  bride.  His  first  real 
glimpse  of  the  little  girl  comes 
early  in  the  morning,  when  she 
comes  skipping  into  the  breakfast 
room  with  her  arms  full  of  flowers 
just  plucked  from  the  garden.  She 
flits  about  the  room,  looping  up 
the  curtains,  placing  a  flower  here 
and  there,  and  before  he  is  aware 
of  it  the  middle-aged  bachelor 
finds  himself  head  over  ears  in 
love.  The  girl  tells  him  all  about 
her  great  love  for  William,  and 
then  asks  him  to  please  call  her 
Dolly.  The  irate  parents,  to  whom 
William  is  an  unknown  quantity, 

75 


M  A  U  D  E     ADAMS 

meet  the  lad  in  the  garden  and 
take  a  great  fancy  to  him,  suppos- 
ing, of  course,  that  he  is  Sir  Jasper's 
son.  Sir  Jasper,  by  the  exercise  of 
a  little  diplomacy  at  the  breakfast 
table,  induces  the  old  people  to 
consent  to  the  marriage  of  the 
youngsters,  and  the  act  ends  by  the 
whole  party  starting  for  London 
on  Sir  Jasper's  coach,  where  they 
intend  to  kill  two  birds  with  one 
stone,  —  see  the  young  Queen's 
coronation  and  get  the  children 
spliced  in  proper  form.  But  in 
London  Sir  Jasper  meets  his  Wat- 
erloo. Dolly,  all  unconsciously, 
has  wound  herself  about  his  heart. 
A  word  from  him  and  William's 
76 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

chances  of  matrimony  would  be 
blown  sky-high. 

The  boy  is  furious  with  jealousy. 
He  reproaches  Dolly  and  demands 
possession  of  her  diary,  in  which 
the  girl  has  written  her  impressions 
of  her  coaching  trip.  Dolly  refuses 
indignantly.  William  decamps,  and 
the  little  girl  in  despair  appeals  to 
Sir  Jasper.  She  reads  him  an  ex- 
tract about  the  beautiful  day  and 
the  beautiful  time  and  the  beautiful 
things  which  Sir  Jasper  has  said  to 
her. 

"There!"  she  exclaims,  trium- 
phantly. "William  has  no  cause 
to  be  angry.  There's  nothing 
about  him  in  that." 

77 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

It  is  all  that  Sir  Jasper  can  do  to 
keep  from  taking  the  little  girl  in 
his  arms.  She  tears  the  leaves  out  of 
her  diary  and  hands  them  to  him. 
"  I  don't  mind  showing  them  to 
you,"  she  tells  him  naively,  "be- 
cause you  don't  care." 
Sir  Jasper  finds  the  boy  and  a 
reconciliation  is  effected,  but  in 
the  meantime  the  Queen's  proces- 
sion has  passed  their  windows  and 
not  one  of  them  has  seen  it.  As 
the  girl  and  her  boy  lover  start 
away,  Dolly  places  a  sprig  of  rose- 
mary in  Sir  Jasper's  hand.  "  This 
is  for  remembrance." 
A  moment  later  the  landlord  of  the 
house  comes  rushing  in,  and  Sir 

78 


MA  UP  E     ADA  MS 

Jasper  buys  the  house  from  him  on 
the  spot.  "  This  house  henceforth 
shall  be  a  shrine  to  me,  a  holy 
place." 

The  last  act  shows  the  same  room 
on  the  day  of  the  Queen's  Jubilee. 
Sir  Jasper,  lame  and  toothless,  hob- 
bles in.  As  he  rings  for  his  ser- 
vant a  piece  of  the  old  wainscotting 
falls  down,  and  from  the  ruins  he 
picks  up  a  leaf  of  yellow  paper. 
Through  his  glasses  Sir  Jasper 
recognises  that  the  word  beautiful 
is  written  on  it  several  times. 
Then  he  remembers  the  little  girl 
who  wrote  it.  What  was  her 
name  ?  Ah  !  yes,  he  remembers 
now.  It  was  Dolly. 

79 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

In  spite  of  the  effectiveness  of  this 
final  scene  Rosemary  would  be  a 
better  play  if  it  ended  with  the 
third  act.  As  it  stands  at  present, 
it  seems  to  signify  merely  "  a  dream 
and  a  forgetting."  This  scene 
must  always  remain  an  open  ques- 
tion. Some  liked  it,  many  others 
did  not.  If  Miss  Maude  Adams 
had  played  Dolly  five  years  before, 
when  she  first  became  Mr.  Drew's 
leading  woman,  she  would  have 
been  credited  with  giving  a  life- 
like impersonation  of  an  ingenuous 
little  girl.  But  coming  at  this 
stage  of  Miss  Adams'  career,  this 
impersonation  of  hers  meant  far 
more. 

80 


MISS    MAUDE    ADAMS 
as  Juliet  in  "  Romeo  and  Juliet.' 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

It. meant  that  she  had  become  a 
consummate  artist.  Never  for  one 
instant  did  Miss  Adams  forget  that 
she  was  playing  the  part  of  an  abso- 
lutely ingenuous  girl.  Exquisite 
is  the  only  word  which  properly 
describes  her  work. 
So  great  was  Miss  Adams'  success 
in  Rosemary  that  her  manager,  Mr. 
Charles  Frohman,  decided  that  the 
time  was  now  ripe  for  Miss  Adams 
to  come  out  as  a  star.  J.  M. 
Barrie,  author  of  "The  Little 
Minister,"  was  on  a  visit  to  this 
country  that  winter,  and  he,  Miss 
Adams,  and  Mr.  Frohman  had  many 
consultations  with  regard  to  the 
advisability  of  turning  his  novel 

6  81 


M  A  UP  E     ADAMS 

into  a  play.  The  contract  was 
signed,  and  early  in  the  following 
summer  the  manuscript  of  his 
new  play  was  delivered  to  Mr. 
Frohman.  Both  he  and  Miss 
Adams  were  so  charmed  with  it 
that  they  immediately  selected 
it  to  be  the  play  in  which  Miss 
Adams  should  make  her  stellar 
debut.  After  a  week  of  pre- 
liminary performances  in  Wash- 
ington, Miss  Adams  made  her  first 
metropolitan  appearance  as  a  star 
at  the  Empire  Theatre,  September 
28,  1897. 

The  Little    Minister  proved    more 
than  a  success.     It  was  a  double- 
barrelled  hit,  a  two-ply  triumph,  in 
82 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

which  Maude  Adams  as  an  artist 
and  J.  M.  Barrie  as  a  playwright 
shared  almost  equally. 
If  Miss  Adams  lives  to  be  one  hun- 
dred, and  if  in  time  to  come  her 
repertory  extends  from  Little  Eva 
to  Lady  Macbeth,  she  will  never 
forget  the  rousing  New  York  wel- 
come which  was  given  her  at  the 
Empire  that  night.  As  for  the 
star  —  well,  if  Miss  Adams  had 
appeared  in  the  worst  play  that  was 
ever  penned  in  the  American 
Dramatists'  Club  she  would  have 
been  royally  welcomed.  That  wel- 
come was  in  fact  a  case  of  "  That's 
for  remembrance."  The  cropper 
which  a  bad  play  might  have 

83 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

brought  her  would  have  been  post- 
poned. But  The  Little  Minister 
was  not  a  bad  play ;  that 's  the 
beauty  of  it.  Technically,  it  defies 
almost  every  stage  tradition,  but 
when  a  man  like  Barrie  handles 
the  reins,  that  is  more  a  relief  than 
otherwise,  and  there  is  a  freshness 
and  a  wit  and  spontaneity  to  it 
that  made  it  to  every  class  of  play- 
goers an  unmitigated  delight. 
Whether  his  work  be  a  novel  or  a 
play,  Barrie  possesses  the  God-given 
knack  of  touching  things  with 
spirit  light.  This  little  play  has  a 
plot  scarcely  wider  than  your  little 
finger,  and  yet  it  teems  with  ro- 
mance, and  there  is  more  real 

84 


MISS    MAUDE    ADAMS 
as  Juliet  in  "  Romeo  and  Juliet." 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

comedy  in  it  than  has  been  shown 
in  all  the  comic  productions  in  a 
year.  The  most  ardent  admirer 
of  the  novel  can  not  find  fault 
with  Mr.  Barrie  for  the  manner  in 
which  he  has  turned  it  into  a  play, 
nor  could  Mr.  Frohman  be  criti- 
cised for  the  manner  in  which  he 
had  cast  it.  The  plot  of  the  play 
wanders  far  afield  from  the  novel, 
but  the  characters  are  all  there, 
—  Lady  Babbie,  Gavin  Dishart, 
and  all  the  prominent  citizens  of 
Thrums. 

Rarely  had  a  star  been  born  under 
more  auspicious  circumstances. 
Miss  Adams  threw  her  whole  soul 
into  her  work  in  this  role.  And 

85 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

well  she  might,  for  Lady  Babbie 
was  a  part  after  her  own  heart. 
She  is  simply  a  little  devil  who 
loves  a  joke  even  more  than  she 
loves  her  lover,  but  Barrie  had 
contrived  two  or  three  serious  little 
scenes  in  the  midst  of  the  fun, 
which  shows  that  after  all  the 
Lady  Babbie  is  deeper  than  she 
seems.  It  is  a  pity,  though,  that 
Mr.  Barrie  chose  to  end  his  play 
so  flippantly.  There  is  no  neces- 
sity for  it.  After  collecting  all  the 
ingredients  for  a  charmingly  senti- 
mental ending  he  brings  in  a  splash 
of  broad  comedy  which  almost 
robs  the  finale  of  its  charm. 
But  there  is  no  use  in  analysing 
86 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

The  Little  Minister.  One  likes  it 
almost  as  much  for  its  faults  as  for 
its  virtues.  All  that  it  is  neces- 
sary to  state  is  that  between  them 
Maude  Adams,  J.  M.  Barrie,  and 
Charles  Frohman  had  formed  a 
solid  syndicate  of  success. 
With  that  performance  at  the  Em- 
pire began  one  of  the  most  remark- 
able successes  in  theatrical  history. 
North,  South,  East,  and  West  Miss 
Adams  played  Lady  Babbie  after 
she  had  concluded  her  extraor- 
dinarily successful  New  York  run. 
Sunday-schools  cried  for  her,  and 
clergymen  of  all  denominations 
flocked  to  see  her  play.  The  fact 
that  in  Rosemary  and  The  Bauble 

87 


MAUDE     ADAMS 

Shop  she  had  done  far  more  artistic 
and  difficult  work  than  anything 
she  did  in  Barrie's  pretty  play  went 
for  nothing.  From  the  four  cor- 
ners of  the  United  States  of  Amer- 
ica the  verdict  of  the  playgoers 
seemed  universal  :  there  was  only 
one  thing  greater  than  The  Little 
Minister,  and  that  was  little  Maude 
Adams.  Children,  corsets,  and 
cigars  were  named  after  her,  —  as 
a  matter  of  fact  I  know  a  ten-year- 
old  child  in  Bridgeport,  Con- 
necticut, who  has  thirteen  dolls,  and 
every  one  of  them  bears  the  same 
identical  name,  Maude  Adams,  and 
how  their  owner  ever  identifies 
them  Heaven  alone  knows.  In- 

88 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

stead  of  letting  her  success  turn 
her  head  completely,  Miss  Adams, 
realising  that  she  was  in  for  a  very 
long  siege  of  the  Barrie  play,  as 
the  public  would  not  permit  her 
to  act  anything  else,  began  to  study 
Shakespeare  in  earnest.  By  the 
end  of  the  second  season  of  The 
Little  Minister  she  had  mastered 
the  role  of  Juliet,  and  Mr.  Froh- 
man  decided  to  engage  a  special 
company  and  produce  Romeo  and 
Juliet  in  all  the  leading  cities  dur- 
ing the  month  of  May. 
Mr.  William  Faversham  played 
Romeo,  Mr.  J.  K.  Hackett  Mer- 
cutio,  while  that  sterling  old-time 
actress,  Mrs.  D.  G.  Jones,  gave  a 

89 


M  A  UP  E     ADAMS 

superb  performance  of  the  Nurse. 
The  opening  performance  took 
place  at  the  Empire  early  in  May. 
The  house  was  crowded,  the  en- 
thusiasm intense,  and,  all  things 
considered,  Miss  Adams  emerged 
from  the  ordeal  far  more  success- 
fully than  any  of  her  best  friends 
imagined  that  she  would.  She  was 
wise  enough  to  realise  that  for  her 
to  attempt  to  play  Juliet  in  the 
traditional  manner  would  be  abso- 
lutely suicidal,  so  she  threw  tradi- 
tions to  the  winds  and  made  Juliet 
a  simple,  girlish  creature  of  infinite 
charm.  It  was  the  master-stroke 
of  a  very  clever  woman,  —  an  act- 
ress who  knew  her  own  artistic 
90 


MISS    MAUDE    ADAMS 
as  Duke  of  Reichstadt  in  "  L'Aiglon/ 


MA  U  D  E      A D A  M  S 

shortcomings  too  well  to  expose 
them.  As  a  literal  matter  of  fact, 
her  personation  of  Juliet  made 
some  of  the  love  scenes  take  on  a 
new  significance,  for  many,  that 
they  had  never  had  before  ;  it  was 
a  treat  in  itself  to  see  a  genuinely 
young  Juliet,  in- the  first  place;  as 
a  general  rule  the  average  actress 
never  attempts  the  role  until  she 
has  arrived  at  those  years  of  pro- 
fessional experience  where  she  is 
transiently  forty,  or  at  least  per- 
manently twenty-nine.  The  youth- 
ful charm  of  Miss  Adams'  Juliet,  in 
short,  made  many  champions  for 
her,  but  her  lack  of  elocutionary 
training  damned  her  with  the  more 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

punctilious  of  the  old-school  critics. 
In  New  York  she  was  treated  with 
far  more  consideration  than  in 
other  cities.  The  experiment  was 
a  great  financial  success,  however, 
and  the  following  September  Miss 
Adams  returned  to  the  treadmill 
with  all  the  more  zest  for  her  tem- 
porary excursion  into  Shakespeare. 
But  the  following  season  Miss 
Adams  soared  even  higher  yet,  and 
in  UAiglon,  although  this  great 
role  shows  her  limitations  as  no 
other  part  has  ever  done,  it  must 
be  honestly  admitted  that  she  has 
added  greatly  to  her  artistic  fame. 
To  say  that  she  has  grasped  the 
possibilities  of  this  part  even  now, 
92 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

when  she  has  been  playing  it  for 
several  months,  would  be  absurd  ; 
her  physical  powers  could  not  reach 
them,  although  her  readings  show 
clearly  that  she  has  fully  grasped 
the  meaning  of  the  part.  When, 
six  weeks  after  Miss  Adams'  ap- 
pearance at  the  Knickerbocker, 
Sarah  Bernhardt  appeared  in 
L! Aiglon  at  the  Garden,  it  was 
inevitable  that  comparisons  would 
be  made.  They  were — but  it  is 
unnecessary  to  enter  into  that  sub- 
ject here.  Miss  Adams  is  still 
playing  L'  Aiglon  to  crowded 
houses.  Madame  Bernhardt  has 
had  a  disastrous  season  through  the 
West. 

93 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

At  the  Academy  of  Music  in  Balti- 
more Maude  Adams  made  her  first 
appearance  in  L!  Aiglon.  She  scored 
an  honest  and  legitimate  success ;  a 
success,  however,  which,  in  the  very 
nature  of  things,  was  subordinate 
to  the  success  of  the  play  itself.  For 
somehow  the  reports  from  Paris, 
enthusiastic  as  they  had  been  with 
regard  to  Bernhardt's  performance 
of  the  play,  seem  scarcely  to  have 
done  Edmond  Rostand's  work  jus- 
tice. Even  Parisians  themselves 
admitted  that  as  played  in  Paris  it 
was  too  drawn  out,  too  talky-talky, 
as  it  were.  In  the  adaptation 
which  Louis  Parker,  supplemented 
by  Edward  Rose,  had  made,  the 

94 


MISS    MAUDE    ADAMS 
as  Duke  of  Reichstadt  in  "L'Aiglon.' 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

pathos  of  the  play  has  been  pre- 
served, while  its  action  has  been 
strengthened  so  successfully  that 
the  interest  never  lags.  With  all 
its  superfluities  of  verbage  cut  away, 
this  play  in  its  English  version 
stands  out  clean-cut,  tremendous, 
like  a  star.  It  is  no  exaggeration 
to  say  that  one  has  to  look  back  to 
Hamlet  to  find  its  peer  in  the  mat- 
ter of  histrionic  possibilities.  There 
are  scenes  which  are  so  great  in 
themselves  that  while  only  one,  or 
perhaps  two,  actresses  in  the  world 
could  realise  their  possibilities,  still 
from  the  very  strength  of  the  scenes 
no  actress  of  fair  ability  could  fail 
in  them. 

95 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

This,  mark  you,  is  no  slur  upon 
Miss  Adams'  work,  for  she  accom- 
plished marvels.  The  great  scenes, 
to  be  sure,  lay  far,  far  beyond  her, 
but  she  brought  out  the  pathos  of 
the  life  of  this  poor  little  eaglet  of 
Napoleon's  with  so  much  delicacy 
and  tenderness  and,  in  some  in- 
stances, power,  that  she  carried  her 
audience  completely  away  with 
her.  In  the  early  scenes  she  so 
completely  fascinated  the  audience 
by  her  own  personality  that  when 
the  great  scenes  came  she  had  her 
hearers  completely  in  her  power. 
The  strength  of  the  situation  swept 
her  along,  and  it  was  n't  until  the 
next  morning,  over  their  ham  and 

96 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

eggs,  in  perfectly  cold  blood,  that 
they  began  to  realise  how  much 
greater  the  play  was  than  the  act- 
ress. At  the  same  time  it  must  be 
conceded  that  in  this  play  Miss 
Adams  scored  the  great  success  of 
her  career.  With  all  her  short- 
comings, her  work  in  U  Aiglon 
was  immeasurably  superior  to  her 
work  in  either  Barrie's  Little  Min- 
ister or  as  Shakespeare's  Juliet. 
But  at  the  same  time  neither  all 
the  king's  horses  nor  all  the  king's 
men  can  ever  make  this  clever  little 
actress  encompass  the  full  possibili- 
ties of  this  great  role. 
She  was  at  her  best  in  the  open- 
ing act.  Here,  Bernhardt  herself 

7  97 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

did  not  surpass  her.  In  the 
scene  where  the  old  tutor  at- 
tempts to  give  her  a  history  lesson 
not  at  all  in  accordance  with  the 
facts,  but  entirely  in  accordance 
with  the  orders  of  her  Austrian 
guardian,  Miss  Adams  was  superb. 
She  played  this  scene  with  a  com- 
bination of  raillery,  wit,  and  satire 
which  carried  all  before  her.  The 
black  garment  she  wore  in  this  act 
made  her  look  ghastly  —  exactly 
the  poor,  frail  little  consumptive 
she  was  intended  to  be.  In  some 
of  her  later  scenes  she  overworked 
her  cough  so  much  that  it  re- 
minded one  of  a  second-rate 
Camille.  But  in  her  performance 

98 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

of  that  first  act  there  was  no  flaw. 
Her  first  great  test,  however,  came 
in  the  second  act,  where  Prince 
Metternich  drags  the  young  Duke 
before  the  mirror  and  bids  him 
look  upon  the  puny,  sickly,  effemi- 
nate face  of  his  father's  son. 
L'Aiglon  snatches  the  lamp  from 
the  Prince's  hand  and  smashes  the 
mirror  into  fragments.  Miss  Adams 
played  this  scene  most  cleverly, 
but  the  strength  of  the  stage  busi- 
ness made  it  seem  almost  great. 
In  the  third  act  Rostand,  the  play- 
wright, could  not  help  her  much. 
The  fancy  dress  ball  at  Schonbrunn 
is  at  its  height,  and  under  the  park 
trees  the  hapless  lad  learns  for  the 

99 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

first  time  the  depths  of  his  mother's 
infamy.  There  was  no  well-man- 
aged climax  to  assist  Miss  Adams 
here.  She  had  to  rely  entirely 
upon  her  facial  byplay  and  her 
elocution.  Both  were  unequal  to 
this  great  task.  It  was  in  this 
scene  that  Miss  Adams'  perform- 
ance reached  its  lowest  ebb.  To 
be  sure,  the  next  act,  on  the  battle- 
field of  Wagram,  where  the  voices 
of  the  thousands  that  Napoleon 
had  slain  arose  to  haunt  him, 
UAiglon  lay  immeasurably  beyond 
the  little  artist's  reach,  but  at  the 
same  time  the  scene  was  so  terrific 
in  itself  that  it  brought  Miss  Adams 
enthusiastic  curtain  calls.  In  the 


IOO 


MISS    MAUDE    ADAMS 
as  Duke  of  Reirhstadt  in  "  L'Aiglon.' 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

closing  act,  the  death  scene,  her 
acting  was  entirely  conventional, 
and  she  lost  a  great  deal  of  the 
grip  which  she  had  upon  her  audi- 
ence throughout  the  earlier  part  of 
the  play. 

In  short,  to  sum  her  performance 
up,  Miss  Adams  accomplished  a 
great  many  more  wonders  than 
any  rational  person  dreamed  she 
was  capable  of.  But  at  -the  same 
time  she  did  not  realise  the  possi- 
bilities of  UAiglon.  And  after 
that  first  performance,  when  she 
finally  got  to  bed,  tired  out  after  a 
great  night's  work  finely  done, 
Miss  Adams  must  have  easily  found 
it  in  her  heart  to  say,  "  God  bless 


IOI 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

M.  Rostand,  Mr.  Frohman,  and  all 
my  stage  managers."  For  Mr. 
Charles  Frohman  had  laid  himself 
out  upon  the  production,  and  all 
the  intricacies  of  Rostand  lines  and 
stage  business  had  been  so  admi- 
rably handled  by  Stage  Manager 
Humphries  that  Miss  Adams'  task 
had  been  made  easier  for  her  a 
hundredfold. 

It  was  in  his  amours  that  Miss 
Adams'  L'Aiglon  was  at  its  weak- 
est. The  young  Duke's  passion 
for  Fannie  Elssler  had  all  the  ardour 
of  water  mixed  with  milk.  After 
she  shed  the  funeral  garb  of  the 
first  act  Miss  Adams  looked  un- 
commonly well.  The  white  uni- 


IO2 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

form  became  her,  and  her  costumes 
were  so  neatly  cut  that  they  made 
her  at  times  look  almost  sturdy. 
Mr.  Parker's  adaptation  had  been 
admirably  done,  but  there  was  one 
great  flaw  in  it.  Indeed,  this 
change  deprived  the  play  in  one 
sense  of  a  great  deal  of  its  natural 
strength :  L'Aiglon  from  first  to 
last  was  made  an  entirely  sympa- 
thetic role.  This  is  all  wrong. 
In  the  French  play,  one  of  the 
strongest  hits  is  scored  when  Ros- 
tand demonstrates  that  his  poor 
little  Eaglet,  beating  hopelessly 
against  the  bars  of  his  physical 
cage,  is  not  only  an  inflamed  en- 
thusiast, but,  when  put  to  the  cru- 
103 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

cial  test,  is  also  an  arrant  coward. 
This  little  wing-clipped  eaglet,  this 
bird  in  a  gilded  cage  which  Miss 
Adams  presents,  is  always  pathetic, 
always  thoroughly  lovable,  but  one 
has  to  strain  both  his  ear  and  his 
imagination  to  hear  him  passion- 
ately railing  against  both  his  fate 
and  his  cage. 

Miss  Adams  had  attempted  a  dar- 
ing feat  and  carried  it  through,  if 
not  with  the  greatest  honours,  at 
least  successfully.  She  had  fairly 
earned  every  ounce  of  the  applause. 


104 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 


%+Part   Third 


While  there  is  no  actress  on  the 
stage  whose  personality  appeals 
more  directly  to  her  audiences, 
Miss  Adams  throughout  her 
grown-up  stage  career  has  drawn 
the  line  very  distinctly  between  her 
stage  career  and  her  private  life. 
She  glories  in  the  fact  that  there  is 
scarcely  a  woman  on  the  stage 
about  whom  less  is  known.  After 
her  great  success  in  the  The  Little 
Minister  Miss  Adams  invested  part 
of  her  earnings  in  a  charming  old 
homestead  and  farm  down  on  Long 
Island.  Here  the  greater  part  of 
105 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

her  leisure  time  is  spent.  The 
place  is  just  near  enough  to  town 
to  enable  her  to  run  down  when- 
ever the  spirit  moves  her  during  the 
week,  and  all  her  Sundays  are  spent 
there  whenever  she  happens  to  be 
playing  in  or  anywhere  near  New 
York.  Another  favourite  resort 
of  hers  is  Anteora,  and  during  her 
holidays  she  is  a  well-known  figure 
in  the  little  literary  colony  there. 
But  Miss  Adams  before  all  else  is  a 
working  woman  and  a  student.  As 
a  lioness  she  positively  refuses  to 
either  growl  or  shine.  She  loves 
horses  and  rides  uncommonly  well ; 
she  has  a  fine  library,  and  spends  a 
great  deal  of  her  time  there.  In 
1 06 


MA  U  D  E     ADAMS 

short,  she  lives  the  life  of  any  other 
rational,  hard-working  artist  who 
realises  the  demands  which  her  pro- 
fession makes  upon  her,  and  is  wise 
enough  to  husband  her  strength. 
Two  or  three  times  a  year  ridicu- 
lously exaggerated  reports  about  her 
health  are  published,  but  they  have 
become  such  an  old  and  exploded 
story  that  neither  she  nor  her  man- 
ager ever  take  the  trouble  to  deny 
them  any  more. 

Miss  Adams  probably  is  not  nearly 
so  robust  as  Mr.  John  L.  Sullivan, 
but  any  woman  who  can  play 
U  Aiglon  seven  times  a  week  cannot 
be  very  much  of  an  invalid.  Some 
years  ago,  after  her  success  in  The 
107 


MAUDE     ADAMS 

Masked  Ball,  Miss  Adams  was  inter- 
viewed. She  expressed  her  opinion 
at  that  time  upon  the  question  of 
publicity,  and  from  what  I  have 
seen  of  her  work  since  then  and, 
better  still,  by  what  I  have  not  seen 
about  her  in  the  newspapers,  I  ven- 
ture to  say  that  Miss  Adams  is  still 
of  the  same  opinion.  At  that  time 
Miss  Adams  said  :  — 
"  Yes,  I  am  very  much  interested  in 
my  work.  It  is  a  good  profession 
for  a  woman.  There  is  no  limit  to 
what  she  can  do  if  she  has  talent  and 
is  willing  to  work  and  wait ;  and  as 
for  the  temptations  —  well,  are  they 
not  everywhere  outside  the  protec- 
tion of  the  home  circle  ? 

108 


MA  UP  E     ADAMS 

"  I  have  n't  had  much  experience. 
I  have  no  theories  and  systems  of 
exercise  and  dressing  and  bathing 
to  interest  people  with,  or  rather  I 
have  beautiful  theories,  but  I  don't 
live  up  to  them.  I  ride  horseback 
and  walk,  and  am  ever  so  much 
stronger  than  I  look. 
"  I  don't  see,  anyway,  why  an  act- 
ress must  give  her  personality  to 
the  world,  though  it  seems  to  be 
expected,  and  those  who  curiously 
investigate  her  private  life  are  not 
always  careful  how  they  use  their  in- 
formation. I  have  n't  very  decided 
opinions  on  the  great  questions  of  the 
day,  but  there's  one  thing  I  don't  be- 
lieve in,  and  that  is  woman's  rights. 
109 


MAUDE     ADAMS 

"  I  think  the  men  have  taken 
pretty  good  care  of  us  all  these 
years,  and  I  don't  see  what  is  the 
matter  with  letting  them  keep  it 
up.  Any  woman  half-way  clever 
can  make  the  men  do  just  as  she 
wants  to  have  them,  and  at  the 
same  time  keep  them  thinking  they 
are  having  their  own  way,  —  and 
what  more  would  she  have  ? " 


I  IO 


THIS  BOOK  IS  DUE  ON  THE  LAST  DATE 
STAMPED  BELOW 


AN  INITIAL  FINE  OF  25  CENTS 

WILL  BE  ASSESSED  FOR  FAILURE  TO  RETURN 
THIS  BOOK  ON  THE  DATE  DUE.  THE  PENALTY 
WILL  INCREASE  TO  SO  CENTS  ON  THE  FOURTH 
DAY  AND  TO  $1.OO  ON  THE  SEVENTH  DAY 
OVERDUE. 


MAY  20  194 

SENT  ON  ILL 

DEC  t  0  2002 

.    .,iOj> 

2r 

U.  C.  ikrv.-  ,-  LtY 

2Jun'49tH 

s 

i 

REC'D  CIRC  DE?T 

•  • 

ft  it  r*  f\  -• 

AUG21 

1959 

3Y 

CJI.ATIO. 

U.C.  BERKELEY  LIBRARIES 


0005283113 


R45267 


THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


